No Illusions
by Lady Kes
Summary: The challenge of Lent was always giving up something he actually liked. This year's choice was particularly difficult. Set pre-Series 7.


The challenge of Lent was giving up something he actually _liked_. As a child he'd tried giving up things he hated anyway (brussels sprouts, courgettes, making his bed) but Father Morgan had pointed out very firmly that this did not fulfill the intention of Lent. It had been his first introduction to the difference between the letter and the spirit of the law.

As an adult, he'd given up sweets, alcohol, caffeine, takeaway, and smoking, among other things. He'd actually given up smoking several times, both in Lent and out of it, but it hadn't taken. The one time he'd asked Dr. Hobson, who _had_ given it up successfully, how she'd done it and why he couldn't seem to, she'd offered him an explanation that began with dopamine receptors and got less comprehensible from there.

So smoking was out, though he knew his GP would be quite happy if it wasn't. He'd considered this year's Lenten penitence prayerfully and not so prayerfully, but the final decision came from Lewis of all people. They'd been called to a scene at a truly ungodly hour, all references to the Almighty intentional, and were waiting for the arrival of the pathologist on call before they approached the body. It was cold but peaceful and he felt like he and his governor were the only humans awake in the world.

"The one man left awake," he murmured, almost unintentionally, but Lewis squinted at him anyway.

"What's that, then?"

"From 'The Listeners', sir, by Walter de La Mere," he supplied, wishing he could smoke to pass the time. As soon as he provided the attribution, Lewis looked irritable.

"Can ye not turn it off? It's two o'clock in the bloody mornin'," he griped, and James realized at that moment exactly what he should give up for Lent.

It was a source of pride and not a small amount of superiority to be able to provide a quote or allusion at any time, and that was precisely the kind of thing he was meant to be giving up. That it also helped him think seemed less important in this case.

"Yes, sir," he replied dutifully, and Lewis looked at him suspiciously. James knew Lewis wasn't really unhappy with him, but James still responded as if he were. Instinct or training? He wasn't sure.

Lewis would have said something else, had even opened his mouth to do so, but the on-call pathologist arrived and all conversation turned to the unfortunate individual in front of them.

* * *

Giving up cultural allusions was harder than he'd first thought it would be. He hadn't consciously noticed how often he referenced poems, books, plays, myths, music, artists, _et al_ until he couldn't. The first time he hadn't referenced something, Lewis hadn't noticed. The fourth time, he had, and by the fifteenth he was starting to look at his sergeant like he'd been poisoned again.

"So, as you can see," Laura was saying, "he was stabbed by someone standing very close, but there are no defensive wounds nor signs of a struggle. He didn't expect it at all."

"Stabbed by someone he trusted," Lewis said, which was the ideal moment for a reference to Julius Caesar, and he glanced at James as if he was waiting for it, then frowned when it didn't come.

"Perhaps his laptop will provide some information," James said, instead of providing the quote, and Lewis frowned further, which Laura noticed with great interest.

"Right," Lewis said, looking at James suspiciously, and turned to go. "Thanks, Laura."

On the way back to their office, Lewis was still looking at him like a puzzle he couldn't quite solve and James did his best to ignore it.

"Sir, have I got something on my tie?" he asked after the fifth searching glance, glancing down just in case.

"No, Sergeant," Lewis said, exasperated but also a bit fond, and thankfully changed the subject to the identity of the person their victim might have trusted enough to let them get within six inches with a large, sharp knife.

It went on like that for the entire forty days (not counting Sundays, but he had a string of Sundays off this year). He wouldn't reference something, someone would look at him strangely, he'd look at _them_ blandly, and then they'd all move on to the task at hand. About halfway through, Lewis might have realized what had happened, but he hadn't asked. He probably thought James wouldn't discuss it, which was a shame because he would have. He didn't believe in shouting his Lenten resolves from the top of the Rad Cam, but they weren't something that fell under the seal of the confessional either. Laura might have realized it too, judging from her slightly knowing smiles every time he didn't mention Houseman, Rembrandt, Dickenson, Gandhi, Sun Tzu, Galileo, Milne, or Austen, to name a few.

* * *

Finally, Easter arrived and with it came both the alleluias and the allusions. It was almost a relief to arrive at a crime scene and be able to look down at a grimacing face without suppressing the reference that immediately appeared in his head.

"A rictus of cruel malignity," he said seriously, and Lewis glanced up, raising his eyebrows before they both focused on the unfortunate individual in front of them.

Back in the office, Lewis was clearly considering the reappearance of the allusions and James waited patiently for him to finish deciding to ask about it. Finally, he paused in his careful typing and glanced up.

"I'm glad to hear a quotation again," he said, which was not at all the opening statement James had expected. "Didn't mean to make you think you had to stop with all that literary stuff in the first place."

"You didn't, sir," James assured him. "It was entirely my own decision."

"Good. I missed 'em," Lewis said, which was even more surprising than the first statement, and James was sure his face had shown his surprise because Lewis chuckled.

"I know you do it to help you think sometimes and it doesn't bother me that you do. Just try not to quote Shakespeare before the sun's up, aye?"

"Yes, sir. No Shakespeare until 'tis the lark and not the nightingale," James replied, and turned back to his work with a smile. This particular Lenten journey had been a success. If nothing else, he'd learned that Lewis had no illusions about his allusions.

-  
Notes: James' quotations are, in order, from Walter de la Mere's "The Listeners", James Joyce's _A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man_, and of course William Shakespeare's _Romeo and Juliet_.


End file.
